So we wonder, contrary to the portrayal of women in one particular historical document, whether Helen Carter, bass player with Do Re Mi, was more than just ‘one of Bon Scott’s last girlfriends’. By the late 70s and early 80s, the musical climate was shifting again, first towards punk and then to English new-wave. Like Merle and Rosalie in 1965, these two musical styles freed women to occupy once male-dominated spaces. “I think I was very lucky because I could have been surrounded by people who said, ‘look you’re a girl don’t worry’,” says Helen. “But with punk, I did have a lot of particularly English role models I could look to, say the Slits, the Modettes and the Aupair’s.”
Punk has been described as the “great leveler”, with “the kind of punk ethic where anyone would get up and have a go”, as Helen puts it, and it encouraged women to take to the stage, and to instruments. Attitudes towards female instrumentalist continued to pervade the scene. “We played around a couple of the pubs and I never felt like a novelty, but I certainly had difficulties with people not believing i was in the band,” remembers Helen. “There was always some reason for me being in that position other being a good bass player. Later down the track there’s all those stories of bouncers at the door saying ‘Oh you’re carrying your boyfriends guitar’ and ‘can you prove you’re in the band’”.
“You get these men, ‘saying sit on my face!’,” continues Helen. “And Deb (Deborah Conway) and I would go, ‘Why? Is your nose bigger than your dick?’”. Their ‘take no shit’ attitude would inspire the band to write a protest of male chauvinism with their song, ‘Man Overboard’, which snuck under the radar and onto the airwaves. After the break up of Do Re Mi she joined the short lived Lupi and showed up later in Underfelt.
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